"Die Religion ist das Opium des Volkes“, wrote Karl Marx, which translates as "religion is the opium of the people" (and is sometimes referred to as "religion is the opiate of the masses”). He said: "Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions.” Marx believed that all of history is the story of social classes and their struggles with each other over resources and wealth. One effect of opium (other than relieving physical pain) is to give you an extended period of relaxation, not the will to fight your oppressors. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opium_of_the_people

Even before Karl Marx had been born in Germany in 1818, Napoleon Bonaparte came out with this opinion: “Religion is excellent stuff for keeping common people quiet. Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich.” Nowadays we have computer games and dumbed-down television – the X Factor, Strictly Bruce Forsyth, fifth rate so-called celebrities eating maggots in the jungle – to keep people quiet. But is religion the only thing that stops the poor from committing murder and mayhem?

The idea is that religion encourages us to accept our lot and put up with inequalities and unfairness, because the next life will be better than this one, as long as we behave ourselves here. We’re supposed to be fobbed off with stories about how the rich will get their comeuppance in due course, because apparently it would be easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for the toffs to get to heaven. Of course, to be able to murder the rich, you need the ability to get close to them, weapons and a lack of fear of the possible consequences of your actions. Perhaps those factors do keep a lot of people “in their place”. As Einstein said: “If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed.”

If conditions become so unbearable that people are starving and have nothing to lose, they are likely to take the law into their own hands eventually. Napoleon would have been well aware of what Parisians did in July 1789, when the price of bread reached an all-time high. The religious beliefs of most French people didn’t stop the mass slaughter of their rich; in any case, the Catholic Church was seen as a wealthy part of the establishment. In Russia in 1917, ice on the railway lines outside Petrograd prevented food supplies from reaching the city, and religion couldn’t have prevented the revolution that followed.

Could it be the welfare state, providing a safety net, which stops the poor from murdering the rich? Does social democracy modify sufficiently the worst excesses of capitalism to prevent the poor from rising and killing the rich and powerful? Research has shown that those societies which are the most equal are the least violent:-http://classonline.org.uk/docs/Why_Inequality_Matters.pdf

So do you agree with Napoleon? Some might argue that religion has never stopped the rich from murdering the poor, but maybe that’s another story…..

JP Cusick wrote:It does not evolve into the different races or into humanity as a whole as the end or highest evolution is always the white man.

That's it? Because of a picture? I think you're reading more into it than what's actually there -- you're perceiving intent when you have no proof that it exists.

Besides, if those pictures showed an ape evolving into a black man, you'd be all over that too ... "That picture is showing that blacks are apes and therefore less than human!!! Evolution is racist!!!"

JP Cusick wrote:It does not evolve into the different races or into humanity as a whole as the end or highest evolution is always the white man.

That's it? Because of a picture? I think you're reading more into it than what's actually there -- you're perceiving intent when you have no proof that it exists.

Besides, if those pictures showed an ape evolving into a black man, you'd be all over that too ... "That picture is showing that blacks are apes and therefore less than human!!! Evolution is racist!!!"

You see no way to make a distinction between an insentient process like evolution, and ta human concept like racism? Seriously? No way for you to see that? Dear oh dear.

The theory of evolution in its popular scientific explanation comes out as racist by preaching the white superiority and black inferiority. wrote:JP Cusick

No it doesn't, as you've been told repeatedly. Two gorilas living in he same forest have more genetic diversity than any two humans, because gorillas are an older species in evolutionary terms, that means they are more evolved. Are you seriously saying that you consider one gorillas from a forest to be a superior "race" of gorilla to another? As that is what you're claiming with your bullsh** about the disparate appearance of Africans and white Europeans. Evolution doesn't claim this, YOU ARE CLAIMING THIS, and you're very wrong, and clearly have no knowledge of evolution, what's more you seem to want to ignore the truth and cling to your ignorance, why is that?

JP Cusick wrote:It does not evolve into the different races or into humanity as a whole as the end or highest evolution is always the white man.

That's it? Because of a picture? I think you're reading more into it than what's actually there -- you're perceiving intent when you have no proof that it exists.

Besides, if those pictures showed an ape evolving into a black man, you'd be all over that too ... "That picture is showing that blacks are apes and therefore less than human!!! Evolution is racist!!!"

Exactly.

You get a cookie.

Shirina wasn't validating your racist claims, she was pointing out how asinine and absurd they are. The disparate nature of human appearance does not indicate that one ethnicity is more evolved. African skin pigment is prevalent in humans in all hot sunny climates to protect against UV, the skin is also thicker, and the features of the face generally more rounded to dissipate heat more easily. In countries that don't have as much sun human skin loses it's pigment, as it hampers the absorption of UV light and the subsequent development of certain vitamins from that process. In extremely cold countries the people there also have thicker skin, in some places as much as 15% thicker to insulate against the cold.

A Chihuahua is the same species as a Great Dane or a Mastif, and they could successful be mated if the physical size difference could be overcome. So they are all equally evolved, although selective breeding has developed dogs widely disparate in appearance, but essentially the same race or species. Are you suggesting that one breed of dog is racially superior to another?

NONE OF THIS DONATES A HIGHER STATE OF EVOLUTION.

Lastly, and I'm going to keep repeating this as long as you keep ignoring it, evolution is insentient, and cannot therefore be racist. As racism is a concept developed by the human imagination.

Generally speaking bigotry is synonymous with ignorance and stupidity, as we see here, this posters comments on evolution are so stupid it's almost impossible to accept that they are made in earnest. Yet how many times have seen theists espouse this level of stupidity and wilful ignorance in order to deny a scientific fact as firmly established as evolution. It's be funny if there weren't some very powerful people trying their damnedest to ruin the education of children with this nonsense. The next time some irate theist accuses me of militant atheism, or bigotry, I shall remind myself of their attempts to deny scientific fact and worse still their attempts to teach it to children as an absolute truth, further, I shall remind myself that despite protestations to the contrary there is never a large vociferous crowd of sensible theists condemning their egregious behaviour.

Dan Fante wrote:I find it difficult to believe Spin could be that good at satire. Also, JPS signed up in 2011

i was thinking more in the sense of common 'trolling' traits than the same person.

posing antagonistic questions,

making antagonistic statements,

jumping into antagonistic positions when another poster opens up the opportunity,

never really wanting to address any issues with debate.

one shouldn't however underestimate the diversity of a schizophrenic's personalities nor their need to troll a number of forums in order to seek out as much attention as possible and feed that addiction.